In order to understand Robert Mercer’s brilliant financial engineering, let’s begin our analysis using three outstanding local Portland beers. They are Rogue Brewery’s Shakespeare Stout, Widmer’s Hefeweizen and Deschutes Breweries Fresh Squeezed IPA. All are distributed by Portland based Columbia Distributing, one of the nations largest beer distributors, which was purchased by the Jim Simons controlled investment fund Meritage in 2012. Simons along with Robert Mercer are Co-CEO of the $100 billion Rentec hedge fund.

This analysis will unravel the relationship between Rentec’s Medallion fund, its company retirement plan, the Meritage private equity fund, which purchased Columbia Distributing in 2012, and numerous tax exempt foundations including those of Jim Simons, Nat Simons and Robert Mercer.

Warren Buffett has announced his largest buyout in history, the $38 billion takeover of Portland, Oregon based Precision Castparts. This is almost twice the size of the Heinz takeover, one of his largest prior takeovers.

Heinz and other Buffett enterprises, including Burlington Northern and Pacific Power, are having a strong negative impact on the Oregon economy.

This includes potato farmers in Eastern Oregon who had a win/win long term relationship with Heinz cancelled, and local communities battling to prevent oil and coal from being shipped by rail thru their communities without adequate safety guidelines.

In late 2014 the tax exempt Oregon Historical Society sold the Sovereign Apartment building, after owning it more than 30 years. The Society maintains an outstanding board of directors and this was clearly a difficult decision. As part of the sale the society negotiated a long-term lease for itself yet its 44 tenants were last month given six months to vacate.